The Intruder
by The Grammarian
Summary: A Lerouxbased tale. What is the fate of the new occupant of Christine's dressing room? A wisp of smoke from the candle climbed to the ceiling and the light from the hallway illuminated the jagged, broken shards of the little mirror, fallen to the floor.
1. Unwelcome

_Dear Adèle,_

_I hope this letter finds you in good health. I trust that mother and the family are well? I have recently moved into a new dressing-room at the Opéra, befitting my increased status. Gabrielle and the children would love it; it fairly reeks of glamour. There is a vast, magnificent mirror at the far wall. It was formerly the dressing-room of one Christine Daaé. But I digress. Send my love to mother and the children, and do take care!_

_Your Devoted Sister,_

_Geneviève_

She finished the letter, heaving a sigh that was punctuated by a yawn. Pushing aside the Époque and slamming down her pen, she stood up with a rustle of skirts. The mirror stared at her as she walked towards it, her own reflection looking out: a short woman with curly dark hair. She clenched her fists, and the reflection did too. It was a glamorous mirror, to be sure. But the room had a dismal air about it that she did not like. The reflection pursed its full lips, its brow wrinkling unbecomingly and the dark beneath its eyes standing out in purpley-shadowy crescents.

Tiredness prickled at her eyes, and she bit her lip unconsciously. Looking down at her white hands, she sighed again and smoothed the dress unnecessarily against her thighs. A chill caressed her round arms and tickled her scalp. She shivered. Growing weary of seeing her reflection, she turned from it and paced the length of the dressing-room.

She inhaled the fading scent of flowers that hung cloyingly in the air, humming to herself as she folded the letter neatly in thirds. She put her nose to the letter, never growing tired of the childish pleasure of smelling the perfumed paper. Sometimes Geneviève missed Adèle and her sisterly ways. But that was what letters were for.

She glanced at the shadowy mirror again, noticing how the candle failed to illuminate fully the gloomy dressing room. The flame twirled restlessly on the blackened wick, reflected exactly in the mirror. Her own reflection danced with golden candlelight. But there were areas of the room whose shadows lingered, such as the door to her closet. The dark was not a comfortable thing, especially not in this dressing room, where so many ghosts lingered. Glancing almost furtively in the mirror again, she remembered that mirrors were said to be windows to the Devil.

She looked away quickly, fiddled with the small mirror on her table, began to hum again. It was something to fill up the silence. She really ought to be getting home. Chastising herself for dallying so, she gathered up the letter and nervously picking up a candle in preparation for her venture into the closet. Opening the door quickly, she held the candle in front of her to illumine the closet as best she could. All that was left was some of Christine Daaé's old things, and her cloak. The little room smelled faintly of its previous occupant's perfume. She snatched her cloak and jumped out of the dimly lit room, fear jumping in her stomach.

Letting out a nervous laugh, she wondered what she was doing. The dark had never held any secrets or fear for her before. But there was something about this room that sparked the imagination…send it spinning into unpleasant fantasies. There was nothing there, Geneviève assured herself. She would soon be home in her flat, and she would go to sleep and forget all about her irrational fear. She hummed louder.

Setting down the candle gently, she pulled on her cloak and wrapped a scarf about her neck. Averting her eyes from the huge mirror, fear jumping in her stomach, she picked up her purse. She opened the door to her dressing-room. She stuck her little hand into the purse, feeling for the key's cold hardness. Pulling it out, she gripped it until her knuckles whitened. A flash of white on the floor send her eyes spinning towards it and her stomach leaping and tumbling with fear as though a thousand horses were running inside of her.

A piece of paper had fallen to the floor; it had been wrapped around her key. Reaching down with a trembling hand, she picked it up, shivering. She gripped the key harder, keeping an eye on the wavering candle flame. The paper had on it two words scrawled in a puerile hand: _GET OUT. _

She gasped, dropping it to the floor in her haste and rushing to her table to blow out the candle. She simply wanted to leave this dressing-room and get home to her flat. Her elbow scraped across the table as she leaned forward and blew out the candle. There was a crash.

A wisp of smoke from the candle climbed to the ceiling and the light from the hallway illuminated the jagged, broken shards of the little mirror, fallen to the floor.


	2. Eyes In The Dark

_Dear Adèle,_

_It was good to receive a letter from you. I am glad to hear that you and the family are well. I do hope you can visit Paris someday, it would be simply capital if we could all see each other in the flesh again, for I do miss you, and the rest of the family. A strange thing happened to me today; I was in my dressing-room when I discovered an anonymous note saying 'get out' on it. However: think nothing of it, as I myself do not. It was most likely some prankster. Hoping to see you soon!_

_Much Love,_

_Geneviève_

Unable to get to sleep after receiving the anonymous note – she would not admit to herself how much it distressed her – she wrote another letter to Adèle. Shivering in her night-clothes, the chilly air sending gooseflesh up her arms, she lost herself in the neat, flowing cursive flowing from her pen. Her mind began to wander, and the scratching of the writing ran shivers down her back.

Her mind wandered to bad places, frightening places. Fear twisted in her gut, but she firmly pushed the thoughts aside with thoughts of meeting Adèle, seeing Mother again when they came to visit her. That calmed her a little. She signed the letter with a flourish and folded it up, smelled the scented paper. But the flowery bouquet only made her stomach turn.

Humming loudly to herself to dispel the silence, she clambered into her bed, but did not close her eyes. The darkness grew steadily more oppressive, until the only friendly space left in the world was the small island of warmth that was Geneviève and her bed. Closing her eyes, she shivered and her eyes flew open of their own accord. The familiar feeling of anxiety clambered into her stomach. She could tell that it was there to stay.

She could hear the landlady. That reassured her some, in a strange sort of way – that she was not the only person alive in the darkness that coated Paris. Oh, but she was being silly! It was only night-time, it would not harm her. The landlady locked up, after all, and she would just go to sleep and…

Geneviève woke with a start. She must have fallen asleep – but an uneasy sleep, as her eyes ached with tiredness and her neck was stiff. It was still dark. Fear jolted in her stomach again. There was someone watching her, she knew – she could almost feel the burning gaze on her. She sat up on one elbow, the sheets chafing her arm uncomfortably. Chills raced down her damp arms, and she gasped as her bleary eyes fixed on two burning yellow eyes that stared fixedly from outside the small window. She closed her eyes – the eyes outside the window made two spots on her closed lids – and opened them again. The eyes were still there. She stared at them until her own eyes burned, and she blinked again, but they did not disappear. She lifted a shaking hand, held it suspended in the air as if to block out the eyes. They stared at her with chilling intensity. _Only a cat, _she thought, and whispered it aloud to convince herself. _Only a cat. It is only a cat._

Cat or not, she tore her eyes away and hid her head under the blankets. The yellow eyes continued to stare even after she fell into an uneasy sleep.

_Dear Adèle, _

_I look forward to seeing you soon._

_Love,_

_Geneviève_

_Dear Geneviève,_

_I presume that you are well? Do write to me soon! I have not received a letter of substantial length from you for a while. Have you run out of time for your poor sister? No, I am just teasing. I shall count down the days until we shall see one another._

_Your Devoted Sister,_

_Adèle_

Waking, stiff, and with sandy eyes and a ravenous appetite, she rubbed sleep from her eyes to read the note that had been brought to her. Her appetite and her rosy complexion both quickly deserted her. _Get out, _said the note in the same puerile script of the day before.

The dressing-room door stared at her ominously. She didn't know that she wanted to be in there. _Come now, _she chided herself. _You are being silly. _She was getting herself worked up over two notes and two eyes in the dark – only a cat. She had received notes like that before, and she had seen cats in the dark before. But did cats' eyes glow with such an unearthly light at night…? Dispelling such thoughts (and assuring herself that there were simply felines on the prowl) Geneviève entered the dressing-room almost at a run. There was a tinkling and crackling as she entered, and the breath hissed in her throat as she saw the remains of the broken mirror from the previous night. _Seven years of bad luck…_She gasped as blood ran in gentle rivulets down her ankle.

It was evening again. She was alert, nervousness constantly twisting in her stomach. Walking quickly to the dressing-room, she prepared herself for entering the dark closet for her cloak. Automatically averting her eyes from the huge, unnerving mirror (when had she ever thought that Gabrielle and the children would like it? It was so unsettling.) and hating herself for it, she glanced at her table and bit off an oath. Three candles burned brightly on her table. More bad luck. She shivered, and ran to snatch her cloak from the closet. The mirror reflected her pale face eerily, and her dark curls bounced on her shoulders as she forced herself to simply walk quickly from the frightening room.

_Dear Adèle,_

_I am truly sorry I have not sent any correspondence of late. I am busy and am in a considerate amount of turmoil. I shall inform you of it when you and the family visit._

_Love,_

_Geneviève_

The damned dressing-room had her on pins and needles. She dreaded the evenings, when she would have to enter the dimly lit room and snatch her belongings. The mirror would reflect her frightened face: dark eyes wide and her pale face offset by the flush that bloomed in her cheeks. She would avert her eyes quickly. _Why? _She asked herself every time, and hated herself for not having the self-control to look her fears in the face.

For they were ungrounded fears, right? Simply a product of her overactive imagination and the cruel prank that had been played on her. She began to repeat this to herself when she entered the dressing-room, a mantra that kept her mind off of those unknown fears. For a few days…it worked. No more candles appeared in her dressing-room, no more pranks and no more broken mirrors.

Geneviève walked apprehensively down the hall to her dressing-room, occasionally looking over her shoulder. Laying a hand on the handle of the doorknob, she hesitated for a fatal moment, the door beginning to swing open. Stepping in to the dressing-room, she let out a startled cry as something fell with a _crash _behind her. Another prank, she thought wildly. _Why? Why? _

She slammed the door, full to bursting with fear. Bosom heaving with frenzied breaths; she stood in front of the door for a moment, looking at her unfamiliar reflection in the mirror. In a week, she had become someone entirely different. Heavy rings of black circled her eyes, and frown lines etched her forehead. She heard footsteps in the hallway, and whirled, eyes wild.

No one. When her breath had calmed somewhat, she sat down at her table, drawing to her with a shivering hand a drab piece of paper. On it, with a stumbling hand, she wrote _Day Eight._ Geneviève could not see anything of herself but the simple reflection in the mirror. She could not see what she had become. She was counting the days that the ghosts were haunting her.

_Dear Adèle,_

_I am not ill, I assure you. I will explain it all soon._

_Your Devoted Sister,_

_Geneviève_


	3. Christine Daaé

_Here 'tis, Chapter Three. Just in case: I do not claim ownership of the singular quote from Gaston Leroux's wonderful novel. Tee hee. Enjoy!

* * *

_

_Dear Geneviève,_

_Your last letter was so short! Dear sister, do inform me of any and all troubles you are encountering at the Opera. Unfortunately, the family will not be able to visit you as soon as we had hoped, as Mother is ill. She is bedridden, and I pray to God that it is not a serious illness. You, too, would do well to ask the Lord to grant her swift recovery. Just yesterday, Gabrielle…_

Geneviève's head jerked up as her delicate ears caught a noise. She strained to hear what it was, to no avail. There was nothing. _I wonder, _she mused. _Is my hearing more acute or am I just worried? No matter. _Her eyes blurred as she attempted to read Adèle's nattering, but again, to no avail. Eyes unfocused, she stared blankly at the mirror, watching the little gold lights that ran along the dark filaments of her hair. She turned her head away when her slack-faced reflection began to look unlike her own. It was her mind, again, playing tricks on her. She turned around.

"Yes?"

Strange. There was no one there. She drew a hand across her smooth forehead, drawing in a deep breath. Feeling more resolute, she reached for her pen, thought for a moment, began to write:

_Dear Adèle_

Her head jerked up again. What was that sound? A distant singing, menacing and terrible, toweringly angry but at the same time far away. It sent gooseflesh rippling up her arms. Sitting there, as still as a hunted animal, she waited. The only movement was the slight rise-and-fall of her bosom as she took shallow, noiseless breaths.

Tonight, Geneviève thought, she would not pray for Mother, but herself.

The room was silent. The great weight of silence pressed down on her head, crept into her mouth and down her throat and pressed in her ears, a low incessant ringing. She felt the familiar fear creeping up her abdomen like a thousand hairy spiders. Her arm twitched heavily, involuntarily. A shiver wracked her whole body, drawing cold fingers down her shoulders. Her scalp tingled. Pulling in a loud breath to break the ringing silence, she turned back to her letter.

_Dear Adèle,_

_I am_

There it was again! What was that sound? She heard that voice, seeming to emanate from the walls themselves. It sang a song she had never heard, a song that she was sure could make skeletons rise from their graves, a sepulchral wailing that was surely the music of Hell. Her arms suddenly pebbled with gooseflesh; the ends of her fingers were cold as ice. She crossed herself with a stumbling hand. An involuntary shudder made her shoulders hunch up, but she relaxed them and set down her pen and stood up.

The singing stopped. Geneviève stood gripping the back of her chair for an awful, entirely silent moment. Then the singing began again, soft and chilling. With cautious movements – as though every step, every breath, every heartbeat could bring disastrous results – she padded towards the door. Her hands were frozen at her sides like claws, as if stiffened by _rigor mortis. _

She put her hand on the doorknob warily, turned it, and opened the door as silently as she could. It opened with a harrowing _creak, _she winced, pale face twisting and her white teeth pulling a strip of skin from her lip.

Was the music coming from the other dressing-rooms? No. She walked as quietly as she could back to her dressing-room, quickly checking behind her shoulder, as customary, to make sure no one was there.

_Dear Adèle, _

_I am encountering no troubles at the Opera that I cannot deal with. Please do not worry, and do not inquire again, as it is tiresome. Give mother my love, dear sister. I will indeed pray for her tonight, and _

Geneviève cast down her pen, looking about the room with a mixture of rage and terror. The music did not cease, and it had not for as long as she had sat there at her desk. She glanced down at the meager amount she had managed to write, and sighed heavily. Writing to Adèle was a chore now, and Geneviève could no longer remember a time when it was not so. The music, meanwhile, continued to pour out of the walls, endless and mysterious and terrible.

"Who are you?" She shouted, louder than she had meant to. The lamp flickered. She jumped, her every movement paroxysmal and infinitely alert, like a hunted animal. The mirror reflected the light from the lamp brightly, and she glanced at it sharply, glaring at her reflection. The music flowed on. Was the music behind her? She wondered. Looked-over-shoulder.

There was a loud _crack. _She started again, but it was only a door slamming. _Perhaps one of the door-shutters, _she thought absently. She looked over her shoulder again. She could not stand this anymore. She had to go home, even if there was no solace there. Looked-over-shoulder.

The pen slipping in her sweaty hands, she reached for the sheet of paper on which she wrote the days. Two days ago had been Day Eight. That would make today Day Ten. _I'm almost getting used to this, _she thought. She giggled humorlessly, a shrill sound like a fork dragged across a porcelain plate. Looking down at the paper, she saw that her careful notations had been overlaid with red, scrawling writing: the same hand which had written her the threatening notes. She did not bother to read it, but simply ripped it to pieces with trembling hands, picked up a new piece of paper, and began to write, looked-over-shoulder.

_Dear Adèle, _

_I am encountering no troubles at the Opera that I cannot deal with. Please do not worry, and do not inquire again, as it is tiresome. Give mother my love, dear sister. I will indeed pray for her tonight. Please do not visit me in Paris at this time, as it would be disruptive to my career. _

_All my love,_

_Geneviève_

She finished the letter without satisfaction, wishing she could break off correspondence altogether. Didn't Adèle know she had enough to worry about? She swung her foot idly beneath the table, gnawing her lip as always. She glanced nervously at the forbidding mirror, and averted her eyes quickly.

Fright! She hunched closer in on herself as her swinging foot hit something beneath the desk. Drawing back, she stared straight ahead and listened to the deafening _thump-thump _of her heart. When her breath had calmed and the monster of fear in her stomach had gone back to sleep, she pulled that last scrap of courage from its hiding place and mustered the daring to glance beneath the table.

There were only papers, a small stack of papers that shone an eerie white in the shadows beneath her desk. Upon closer, hesitant examination, Geneviève found that they were letters, or perhaps pages from a journal, written in a neat round hand. With cautious fingers, Geneviève pulled the stack out into the light.

The very first piece of paper was a letter of some sort; Geneviève's eye was drawn to a dire pronouncement in the letter: _I do not know myself when I sing. _She rifled through the letters, the paper rustling like the wings of a bird. It was an eerie sound, and the only sound in the room apart from the blood rushing in Geneviève's ears. _Dear Raoul, _said a letter. And another was signed with a name, the neat round handwriting now trembling and indecisive: _CHRISTINE DAAÉ._

She knew that she had taken the place of one Christine Daaé at the Opera. She knew that she was in Daaé's dressing-room. Christine Daaé was a singer. But who _was _she? What haunted the dressing-room of this Christine?

Who was Christine Daaé?

_Dear Geneviève,_

_I apologise for my late correspondence, but I may tell you happily now that Mother is on the mend! We were very worried for a spell, but her illness seems to be passing now. Regarding _your _latest letter, I must restate that I _am _your sister! I do hope that you will still remember your family now that you have a blossoming 'career!' But truly, dear sister, I love you – we love you – and I miss you deeply. Please write soon, and tell us what is happening in your exciting life in the city._

_Love,_

_Adèle_


End file.
